Growing Up in Nonya kitchen

Back in the early 1980s, even as a large family, we would gather at our favourite makan
(eating) spots from time to time. One was at the Hong Lim HDB Complex near Chinatown
which was coincidentally named after our ancestor. But the more important reason was that
the hawker centre there had a concentration of very good Hokkien mee soup stalls.

As the family got bigger and it became harder to seat everyone, my mother began to
include this noodle soup in her Sunday repertoire. Unfortunately, her recipe for this was
incomplete when I did my research and I had to approximate as much as I could, at the same
time acknowledging that it would never mirror the secret recipe that the hawkers used.
I incorporated sensible things that a home cook would do to improve the flavour of a soup
stock, by brewing sufficiently long and by enhancing the taste through the contribution of
the various ingredients.

What I most remember of all those meals at the Hong Lim hawker centre was the large
prawns (shrimps) that enhanced the dish. And to me, it seemed like the larger the prawns,
the better the dish tasted.